Leveraging Emotions for Business Success - Written by Dan Hill

The first chapter teaches us the importance of emotions in our day to day lives.

The human brain consists of 3 parts; (i) the rational part, (2) the sensory part and (3) the emotional part. Our brain is mostly influenced by the non-rational parts and everyone has probably already experienced a situation where feelings happened before thought. This is due to the fact that the conscious thoughts of the brain are only a small portion (<0,005%) of our mental activity.

Stimuli trigger emotions in all of us, but sometimes we can‘t or won’t say what we really feel. Dan Hill found a way to analyze the emotions that people show. Due to the unique properties and the uniform expressions of the face, it is possible for somebody to read faces and to quantify the emotions afterwards. This method is even valid for a person born blind.

A key learning of this research is that people’s attention can be attracted more easily if communication is on-emotion rather than on-message. The human brain is continuously overloaded with information and it is relieved when it can filter out any unnecessary information. If a message doesn’t activate an emotionally hot button, it will be filtered out immediately.

The second chapter highlights the importance of emotions in marketplace applications. 

Branding is about consumers who want to see their personal beliefs mirrored in the brand they purchase. In fact, the brand should fit the social group to which they hope to belong to. Great brands create a group of friends who share an emotional bond. Good branding should prevent people to become concerned that they’ve invested their money in a company whose story lacks power. This means that brands should stand for a destination greater than reality by over-delivering emotionally but never over-promising rationally.

The basis of a great packaging design is to be both inspiring and emotionally relevant. A great design has a pay-off for each part of our three-part brain. Flimsy packaging may save money on the factory floor but will definitely cost money on the sales floor. On the other hand, companies should avoid “feature-itis”; the tendency to over-think and over-execute the product design.

The best advertising addresses the human desire for something big, new and positive. Therefore, an ad should be able stop people and slip past their brain filters. Furthermore it should take the invisible line into account. Hot buttons have to be pushed effectively enough to be engaging but not too hard so that the customers end up feeling offended. A key learning for the advertising industry is that over-reliance on rational messaging won’t achieve persuasion, and without persuasion the message will be neglected or filtered out by the human brain filters.

When dealing with sales objectives, it is good to know that willingness to pay is emotionally based.  Therefore sales people should approach prospects by building a relationship. Prospects could fear that they are making an uninformed purchase decision and therefore cancel the deal. It is up to the sales person to give them comfort and assurance by creating a credible atmosphere. Furthermore, a sales person should avoid pleading for the sale. Whenever that happens, the sales person will be seen as a beggar instead of a provider.

The retail level is the utmost important level to interact with customers, but many companies fail to establish the right atmosphere that facilitates emotional bonding.  When customers have to queue too long, they experience a loss of control because they are forced to wait. Therefore 64% of consumers say they will leave a store if checking out takes too long. In fact, customers want a shopping experience to be like on-demand TV. Up to 70% states to shop at stores where they get the feeling they aren’t wasting their time.

The third chapter highlights the importance of emotions in workplace applications.

Emotions are important when talking about leadership because business has also a human side. Each strategic plan has to be implemented throughout the whole organization.

“Leadership isn’t something you do writing memos, you’ve got to appeal to people’s emotions. They’ve got to buy in with their hearts and bellies, not just their minds” Lou Gerstner, former CEO IBM.

Sometimes leaders have to implement change in their organization. Therefore it is good to know that change could be perceived as rather negative by employees. Some may feel betrayed because they haven’t asked for this change. Others could feel powerless because change brings chaos, which results in a lack of control on the situation.  A change situation can also have an effect on the human capital turnover. Some employees can be classified as ‘survivors’ since they will do anything to hold on and stay loyal to the company, whilst others, mostly high achievers, can readily go elsewhere because they do not have the patience for the turmoil and paralysis that comes with change.

To create the foundation of a great workforce, companies have to hire skilled individuals. When doing so, most companies simply overlook the role of emotions in their application procedure. Companies should pay more attention to interactive skills than to skills and level of experience mentioned on the, mostly inflated, curriculum vitae. 

“We tend to do business with whom we like, people like us who share our beliefs.” – Dan Hilllf